He Knows
by Harlequin Sequins
Summary: Too human, he knows. Without his gloves, he feels too much and it’s not something he likes. Not at all. A short Joker character study.


There's something cold about the place. He just can't put his naked little finger on it, but it's cold and he's cold and…there's something dripping off in the distance. And he knows, knows in the little side-stepping corner of his brain that doesn't want to know anything, it's something just as chilled as the rest of him. He wants to feel it. Feel it seep through his open hands, pool in the creases of flesh in his palms, and let it trickle down his spidery arms. Too human, he knows. Without his gloves, he feels too much and it's not something he likes. Not at all.

He's thinking about blood. That trickling sound set it off, a little pipe bomb somewhere in his mind that he just can't dig out and use on his own prison. He's made plenty of mind bombs, one's he'd like to stick in mouths and watch make pretty splatters across the walls. He wants to take a pipe bomb from his mind, light it with insatiable fire, and throw it at the light bulbs, watch it burn. He wants to stick them in the pipes and dance in the makeshift rain, let his greasy green hair, more yellow now than its usual hue because of his condition, drink in the rain and let it seep down into the empty place where a soul used to be.

Sometimes he wondered if he ever had a soul. If he ever used it, or peeled it back to see the unending monotony of human questions. Who am I? What is my purpose here? Why does this all exist? Too much question. Too little answer. He likes to blow things up and that's the answer. I am the monster. My purpose is to take what's mine. This all exists for me.

She's pretty when she walks by. In fact, she's always pretty when she's walking. All legs that he wants to chew on until they bleed and she howls and then he has to commit them to memory because they just taste so good.

Screaming.

The memory of her screaming. Sharp and pointy in his ears so much that they bleed and before he knows it, he's started a bloodbath.

And he loves it. How he loves the aching warmth of blood. How he loves to feel it drip down his many faces, feel the soul he consumed and one by one throw away memories. Love, life, happiness…let the foundations be destroyed. And he will. Even God knows he will.

But today, she's walking again.

A red skirt, red lips...she's a symbol of all he wants most. He knows she's going nowhere. Just walking to feel purpose sink into her legs and then she's filled with it. But then he wonders at the frown gripping her brow.

And he sees it. She's filled up. She doesn't know what to do with all the purpose she has that now she walks like one overly sated. There's lust in the eyes that stare down one long, empty hall and a potential. There's so much emptiness behind the lust that he wants to fill it. Chaos, cruelty and a laughter that never goes away. Not in pain, not in life at all. Just a subsistence thriving on the sound of something empty of mirth.

And suddenly he wants to break her. See what kind of sounds she plays on the inside. Wondering if there's music underneath the skin, or just the cold silence. He doesn't know what's underneath him.

There's sound in his ears, and he thinks it's the click of her heels. He feels it thrum through him, like the buzz of excitement and imagination pulsating in mad groping thrills in his empty stomach. He knows its really a countdown. She's a walking bomb, and every tick is closer to a detonation of will. A breakdown so beautiful in its madness and unhinged existence he'll hardly be able to resist a bite.

She's facing him, but with what face he wonders. There's Harleen mostly. He gets bored of her often because all she knows is questions. She latches onto them like parasites and soon they're sucked dry. Clean and deserted, but too much like nothing to be considered anything at all. Harleen's always hungry and searching for more and more and more.

But then there's Har, which sounds incomplete in his ears, who knows a good laugh when she sees it. All he wonders about her is if he should ever call out would she answer with a giggle or a thorough cackled tune?

And then, behind another mask, there's one named Harley. He likes her best. She's out of her mind, really, and sometimes Harleen's too caught up in her questioning to chase Harley's answer. Harley's one hell of a woman, and he'd like to sink his teeth into her. Really feel what she's like and the carnal lust he feels radiating off Harleen's stoic skin mask.

Sometimes Harley talks to him. Sometimes he talks right back, and Harleen watches him, as if he's strange when it's really her that so disconnected from herself that she can't recognize opportunity when it's there in front of her. Scarred and manipulating and luring her slowly in.

There's always the wonder why she's really there. Because it's late and there's some kind of semblance of a moon overhead sinking its melancholy light through the brick wall.

And he knows its full cause he feels so positively out of his skin and restive with the cravings for slaughter. He always knew it was the moon, grasping him and pulling out the soul in him. Tearing it out by its pathetic little roots.

But he also knows she's curious. Yes, why else would she set off her time bomb again if she didn't make to lure him in? Harley's in there and he knows it because she knows just what he likes.

Stiletto heels against the cold hard floor and he wishes there was blood there. Fresh flayed skin too, hot off its cooling bones and limp without its boney base. That'd just make the prettiest picture he ever hopes to see.

Harley's fighting for dominance, because she knows Harleen's weakness. So does he, and he searches the eyes, staring blue and subordinate behind black-rimmed glasses sitting so pretty on her sloping nose. He wants his red. The red he smears on his mouth to remind the world his bloodshed. Share it with her and see how she likes the taste.

But there's too much question yet in Harleen that makes Harley want to run. And he knows there's time yet before Harleen relents and sheds her mortal skins and lets Harley out to play.

He can wait. And God knows he can.

* * *

Author's Notes: Just a Joker character study so I can reclaim the feel for his intricate character. I'm so out of practice with writing him that I felt a trip down his twisted path of thinking might help me grasp the feel of him again. Loved every second of writing this. Sorry if it's crap but - I enjoyed it. :D

I'll be updating _Scream Sanctuary _by late tomorrow or early Monday. Keep an eye on your alerts and I'll have it out A.S.A.P.

Thanks for reading!


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